Mailing address
One Brattle Square 513
79 John F. Kennedy Street
Mailbox 134
Cambridge, MA, 02138
Thomas M. Nichols
Research Fellow, International Security Program/Project on Managing the Atom
Contact:
Telephone: 617-496-2352
Fax: 617-496-0606
Email: thomas_nichols@hks.harvard.edu
Experience
Thomas M. Nichols is Professor of National Security Affairs and a former chairman of the Strategy Department at the United States Naval War College in Newport, R.I., where he also holds the Forrest Sherman Chair of Public Diplomacy. He previously taught international relations and Soviet/Russian affairs at Dartmouth and Georgetown. He holds a Ph.D. from Georgetown University, an M.A. from Columbia University, the Certificate of the Harriman Institute for Advanced Study of the Soviet Union at Columbia, and a B.A. from Boston University.
He was personal staff for defense and security affairs in the United States Senate to the late Sen. John Heinz of Pennsylvania and served as a Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. He is currently a senior associate of the Carnegie Council on Ethics and International Affairs in New York and a fellow of the International History Institute at Boston University.
His most recent book, about the revolutionary changes taking place in how nations go to war, is Eve of Destruction: The Coming Age of Preventive War (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2008).
His current project is on the reform of nuclear strategy and the reduction of international nuclear inventories.
AP Photo
September 17, 2009
"Obama Made the Right Decision on Missile Defense"
Op-Ed, National Review Online
By Thomas M. Nichols, Research Fellow, International Security Program/Project on Managing the Atom
"Despite the outcry that President Obama has sold out the Europeans and caved to the Russians by cancelling missile defenses in Europe, it was the right thing to do. Those defenses were not going to work (or work well enough or soon enough to matter in any major crisis with Iran), and the diplomatic price we were paying for them was far out of proportion to any small gains we might have made by annoying the Russians or reassuring the Czechs and the Poles...."
AP Photo
June 2009
"Improving Russia-U.S. Relations: The Next Steps"
Policy Memo
By Thomas M. Nichols, Research Fellow, International Security Program/Project on Managing the Atom
There is no endemic reason for Russian-U.S. relations to be as tense as they have become over the past several years. Th is situation is largely due, on one side, to mishandling of Russian affairs by both the Clinton and Bush administrations, and on the other by the obvious manipulation of anti-Americanism for domestic gain by the Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev administrations in Russia. Unfortunately, this means that only unilateral U.S. action can undermine the cynical policies of the Russian leadership and restore dynamism to the Russian-U.S. relationship.
April 10, 2009
"The Future of U.S.-Russian Relations"
Presentation
By Thomas M. Nichols, Research Fellow, International Security Program/Project on Managing the Atom
Dr. Thomas M. Nichols gave the keynote address at a symposium on U.S.-Russian relations which was sponsored by Tufts University on April 10, 2009.
February 24, 2009
"The Move Toward Preventive Military Action is an International Phenomenon"
Magazine or Newspaper Article, Rorotoko
By Thomas M. Nichols, Research Fellow, International Security Program/Project on Managing the Atom
"...[P]reventive military action is a lot bigger than George Bush, 9/11, the UN, or anything else. The problem is not as new as you might think; the erosion of national sovereignty and the growing temptations of preventive war have been in the works since at least the late 1980s, and in countries all around the world."
AP Photo
December 29, 2008
"Bush's 'Orphans' Haunt the World"
Op-Ed, Toronto Star
By Thomas M. Nichols, Research Fellow, International Security Program/Project on Managing the Atom
"Presidents are often remembered for the things they did, but like many administrations before his own, a significant part of George W. Bush's legacy might well lie with the things he failed to do. The Bush administration essentially "orphaned" several foreign policy issues after 2000 (relations with Mexico and Canada, and the environment, among others) but two are particularly important: tensions with Russia and the future of nuclear arms control."
AP Photo
December 8, 2008
"A New Cold War? Western Hemispheric Manuevers"
Op-Ed, National Review Online
By Thomas M. Nichols, Research Fellow, International Security Program/Project on Managing the Atom
"Visiting the Panama Canal and sending bombers and ships to Venezuela might seem like a flexing of Russian muscle in America's backyard. But these acts are nothing more than mere stunts, expressions of a wounded Russian national ego....The new administration should ignore Russia's juvenile, attention-seeking behavior and return to a discussion of matters that are far more important to both of us, including terrorism, nuclear security, and better cooperation in the midst of a global economic crisis."
